A trip to Blue Planet Aquarium with the twins
My husband and I had one of our first ever dates at Blue Planet Aquarium and have been wanting to take our twins to have a wonder round for ages. In the past, we’ve always hesitated because lots of people on our twin Facebook groups had reported that double buggies struggled to get round some of the corridors, and most importantly, the enormous shark tunnel!
On our way home from holidaying in North Wales last week, we needed to make a quick emergency pitstop, and as it happened, we were right by Blue Planet, so we thought we’d give it a go while we were so close. The twins are almost two and a half and they’re getting better at holding our hands every day, so we decided to leave the buggy at the buggy park in the main entrance and go buggy-free!
I thought the ticket prices were quite steep, but by the end of the trip, I felt as though we had just about got our money’s worth. My husband and I took a twin each and managed to keep them entertained for a good couple of hours. To my delight, both twins actually showed interest in the fish tanks and enjoyed standing to watch the various fish and other aquatic life on display for several minutes at a time. It might not sound like much, but it was a big win for us!
Both twins particularly enjoyed the rock pool themed area where there were textured exteriors to the tanks, and some of the tanks had open tops just low enough to be able to touch the water. My daughter happily examined the textured tanks while my son took great pleasure in sticking his fingers in the tank until a fish came along and he thought better of it.
When it came to the enormous tank that Blue Planet is well known for, the twins weren’t enormously interested in looking. They’d already seen a lot of fish by this point and were far more interested in running around the wide open space of the auditorium in this area. There weren’t many people around so we let them have a few minutes to run around before we headed to the fantastic shark tunnel.
The shark tunnel really is wonderful, and definitely an absolute joy for adults. Within the tunnel, the floor is split into two, a regular walkway, and a moving floor, much like what you find in airports. Sure enough, I don’t think our double buggy would have fitted in this bit, so we made the right decision to leave it at the buggy park! While I would happily stand on a moving walkway taking me through a shark tunnel for hours on end, my toddlers didn’t have the same outlook. It’s quite a long tunnel, and everyone was fine for the first few minutes, but after a while both twins started to get restless. As the aquarium wasn’t very busy when we were there, it wasn’t much of a problem to be able to just overtake people and walk to the end, but I imagine this would be a bit of a nightmare if it’s busy!
Once we reached the end of the main aquarium, we were faced with the restaurant, gift shop, and outdoor play area. Since my twins are Covid babies, they’ve not actually had that many opportunities to explore big play areas, so we went outside and let them run wild for a good half an hour. Again, the play area wasn’t busy at all and we were the only people there at times. It was incredibly well set up and age appropriate for older toddlers, so it a great experience watching my two explore completely safely!
Ultimately we had a really good afternoon, and felt like our tickets were worth it. It probably goes without saying, but I think Blue Planet is somewhere that children will get more out of the older they are, so I will definitely bring my twins back in future!
Have you ever visited Blue Planet Aquarium in Chester? What did you think?